Kick of Coriander Usually Leaves as a Different Beer Entirely

Johnson City Brewing brews Kick of Coriander every other week through the busy months, then turns almost all of it into Peaches. This time a seven-barrel batch stayed put. The amber ale hits draft Wednesday.

• Style: American Amber Ale
• Release Date: 2026-09-30
• ABV: N/A
• Johnson City Brewing Company (Johnson City, TN)

Johnson City Brewing Company has a beer its customers keep asking about, and the brewery's answer is unusually candid: they brew it constantly, and it almost never leaves the building under its own name.

Kick of Coriander, an American Amber Ale, goes on draft Wednesday at Johnson City Brewing Company in Johnson City, Tennessee. Cans are expected to follow shortly after. The batch is seven barrels, or roughly 217 gallons.

That release is a small production decision the brewery has chosen to explain out loud. Kick of Coriander gets brewed about every other week during the busy months, according to the newsletter, and every one of those batches has been converted into Peaches, a separate beer in the lineup. This time the brewery held one back and let it ship as itself.

The reason that routing exists is documented on the brewery's own beer list, and it is worth the detour. Kick of Coriander began as an error: then-head brewer and co-founder Eric Latham put far too much coriander into a light amber ale. Peaches came from a second error, when the first Kick of Coriander batch brewed on the seven-barrel system finished too hoppy and Latham added peaches to correct it. The brewery calls the result a Double Happy Accident. Over time the name shortened from Peaches and Kick of Coriander, to Peaches and Kick, to just Peaches.

So the beer arriving Wednesday is the base recipe that usually becomes something more famous than itself.

Johnson City describes it as a beer drinking beer with a bit of intrigue from the coriander, and rates the aroma above even the flavor. The brewery is the source for that assessment.

Coriander is a well-established brewing spice, though it usually turns up somewhere else. It is standard in Belgian witbier, where it works against wheat and a pale, tart base. An American Amber Ale is a different proposition, built on caramel and toasted malt rather than brightness, so the spice has more sweetness to cut through and less room to hide. The brewery does not elaborate on why it reaches for coriander here, and the honest answer appears to be that nobody planned it. On the table, an amber with a citrusy, faintly peppery edge would sit comfortably next to something grilled, or sharp cheddar.

Kick of Coriander pours Wednesday, September 30, on draft, with cans to follow. Johnson City Brewing Company operates taprooms on Walnut Street and in Boones Creek.